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REGULAR DEADLINE: July 31st
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Our regular deadline is fast upon us. Until midnight July 31st, submitting Fan Films and Shorts is only $35, Features $45. What better place is there for your SciFi film to screen than The Geek Capital of the World, Austin TX. In his latest blog entry, Don Elfant, our Director of Development and Marketing, looks at the city fastly becoming a mecca for all things Other Worldly. Our preferred method of submission is through our own website, but you can also use FilmFreeway or Withoutabox.
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Deadlines and Details
Upcoming Screenings
To Be Announced August 27th 9:30pm, Texas Premiere Mark your Calendars, Tickets only $10
SciFi Film Submissions
Features/Shorts/Fan Films prior to July 31st $45/$35 August 1st - September 30th $50/$40
Features & Teleplays/Shorts prior to August 15th - $50/$35 August 16th - October 15th - $70/$45
Badges
On Sale NEXT WEEK
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Austin: The Geek Capital of the World |
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By DON ELFANT — Austin’s official slogan is “Live music capital of the world.” It’s a well-deserved honor but one Austin might be losing as one classic venue after another closes up shop. Austin’s unofficial motto is “Keep Austin Weird.” This originally was aimed at getting people to patronize independent local businesses instead of national chains. But it’s taken on a life of its own as a kind of mantra for the city.
An ever-growing part of Austin’s “Weird” culture is its geek community. For years, Central Texas has been known as Silicon Hills for its high number of tech companies. Austin also has a dizzying number of game studios. And Austin’s demographics skew young. All of this contributes to an accepting, inquisitive, and somewhat compulsive populous. In other words, The Geek Capital of the World.
Many other cities have a deep geek culture. Like them, Austin has a multitude of great comic book and gaming/toy stores and even some classic arcades. Other cities may have a horror group; Austin has two organizations with over 2,000 members combined: The Austin Horror Society and Blood Over Texas. You can even dance at the Austin Vampire Ball, put on by the The Vampire Court of Austin. Other cities may even have a Quidditch team, but have they won the Quidditch World Cup three years in a row? UT Austin has.
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10 Screenings: $42 Limited Quantities Available
Festival 411 Dates: December 3-5, 2015 Venue: Galaxy Highland 10 of I-35 Mailing Address: P.O. Box 204295, Austin TX 78720
The Team Bears Fonté Founder and Director of Programming Don Elfant Director of Marketing and Development Jordan Brown Programmer and Dir. of Submissions Debbie Cerda Programmer and Outreach Director Courtney Hazlett Programmer and Director of Operations Reid Lansford Programmer and Screenplay Director Dan Repp Programmer and Events Coordinator Gemmi Galactic & Mark Martinez Social Media Team Kelsey Hockmuller Creative Personnel Coordinator Micheal Thielvoldt Programmer and Tour Director |
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SCIFI Scores and the Sound of Other Worlds |
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By BEARS FONTE — Recently I contributed to an article for INVERSE.COM about the best Science Fiction Scores of all time. I was part of a panel of experts that included a film studies professor and self-procalimed ‘snooty cinephile.’ It got me thinking about how score is normally used in a film, to back up and support the emotion on screen, and how that general understanding just doesn’t work in science fiction.
In a SciFi film, every detail becomes part of the atmosphere creating this previously unknown place. Maybe it's an alien world, like in James Horner’s score for ALIENS, maybe it's a new understanding of ourself like in Shane Carruth’s own score for PRIMER, but in a SciFi film, when the director is asking the audience to take a leap of faith with them into some mysterious territory, score must do much more than just be an audible backdrop for the dialogue. Here are a few ‘classic’ SciFi scores, ones that come up time and time again as being the best, and my thoughts on them (spoiler: I often disagree), with a few often overlooked gems.
ALIENS (James Horner) – James Horner is (was) a bit of a machine, and I often feel his scores are a bit paint by numbers. Every so often he finds a film that he really connects to or is so out of his comfort zone it brings something really special out of him. That’s what Aliens is – it’s dissonant and creepy, other worldly and subtle. The themes are melodic when they should be, but aren’t afraid to dive into some pretty challenging material.
PLANET OF THE APES (Jerry Goldsmith) The 1968 masterpiece is a combination of spaghetti western and Avant Garde jazz weirdness that perfectly captures the experience of crash landing on a foreign planet. This is a score that actually can’t be put on as background music to study or at a dinner party, it demands the visual image for context. He did the third film as well, ESCAPE FROM THE PLANET OF APES, and reset many of themes in a more domestic mold (modern day US). Goldsmith did a number of great scores, and seems to always match the tone of the film, such as his joyous bizarre chaos of GREMLINS.
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CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND (John Williams) – You cannot have a conversation about Science Fiction scores without this one. This is the definitive example on this list where the score actually becomes the plot of film, allowing the aliens to make contact with us through musical phrases, at the climax of the film. It’s a jarring collaboration of synthetic tones, brass stabs and majestic strings that draw the film from its widespread opening mystery to its unified beauty at the end. Of anyone, John Williams most deserves to have two films on this list (that’s right, Star Wars after the jump).
THE FOUNTAIN (Clint Mansell) – Mansell is a great composer – Requiem for a Dream may be the most played score in my collection -- but the problem is, The Fountain is just not a very good film, so no matter how good the music, the images on the screen just do not do it justice – and that is the fundamental thing about a score, it only exists to serve the film. In this case, the music overwhelms the imagery, because the story is so convoluted and forced. I can listen to the score by itself, and enjoy it as a piece of classical music, but it doesn’t make me want to watch the movie. Nothing could do that.
ROBOCOP (Basil Poledouris) – To me, Robocop always felt like the most preposterous idea for a TV show that somehow got made as a film instead, and the score captures that – 80’s procedural chugging along with strings, brass and xylophones just getting more and more dissonant. This is a very original score, which doesn’t get the credit it deserves. Another great SciFi score from Poledouris is STARSHIP TROOPERS which captures the jingoism and patriotic bombast of WW2 USA in a future context.
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Meet Don Elfant, Director of Marketing and Development
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Profile by COURTNEY HAZLETT — Don Elfant has been with team for a while, and even wrote the first several profiles, so its sort of ridiculous that we hadn’t profiled him until now. Courtney rectifies that. You can see Don at all our events, and he is the one working to get all the great press for our filmmakers.
1. Where are you from originally and what brought you to Austin? Born and raised in Houston (oh, the humidity!). Came to Austin to attend The University of Texas and never left. I majored in Advertising and minored in Sleeping Late. 2. What drew you to want to join the OWA team? And what do you enjoy about being the Director of Marketing and Development? Bears Fonte drew me in. We’re friends and, at the time, we were in the same screenwriters’ group. We once even wrote a SciFi script together. So, when he said he was starting a SciFi film festival it sounded like the perfect opportunity. Plus, who doesn’t want a boss named Bears? The best part about my job is working with filmmakers to promote their films. They work so long and put so much energy into one project and then they trust me to get the word out. It’s gratifying just to be a part of it.
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3. What advice do you have for anyone interested in working in marketing? Before you start getting creative, know your prospective audience. Be clear about what you want them to know and what you want them to do. It is at that point you can do the fun part. There have been many famous ad campaigns that won awards for creativity but did nothing to achieve their actual goals.
4. What is your favorite SciFi show or film?
I’m old school – STAR TREK: TOS. I watched it in reruns as a kid with my older brother, Alan. It had a profound effect on me. I learned about race, war, and inequity. ….
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Are you on the Badge Presale List?
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OWA badges are going on sale soon – sometime next week – and there will only be a limited number available. Sign up today and you’ll be notified right as badges go on sale. While this doesn’t guarantee you a badge, it will greatly increase your odds. Badges will be available on a first come, first serve basis.
Securing your badge is important because it guarantees you a seat at each screening time. For only $42 you will get to see a minimum of ten screenings, both features and shorts programs. And every single film will be an Austin premiere!
Also, OWA promises to not oversell the festival. We will only sell the number of badges that we have seats available.
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There’s only one rule you need to remember: be on time. Your seat is guaranteed as long as you arrive at the theater at least 15 minutes before the screening time. If not, you will have to go to the end of the general admission line – and they will be buying individual tickets to any open seat.
In only its second year, Other Worlds Austin has already established itself as one of the premier SciFi festivals in the country. Last year the festival featured two world premieres, three US premieres and all the rest Texas Premieres, including audience award winner TIME LAPSE. OWA is firmly committed to supporting exciting filmmakers, by giving them exhibition opportunities for films that are often overlooked on the film festival circuit.
Signing up is fast and easy, so why put it off? There is no commitment to buy – although when badges go on sale, you won’t want to wait long if you want one. So sign up to have first access.
Be the first to be notified when badges go on sale. And enjoy the festival!
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Also on OtherWorldsAustin.com
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WELCOME TO THE OZPOCALYPSE |
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by Mark Martinez — The success, artistically and financially, of Fury Road may bring a new wave of this type of film that has laid dormant for several decades. In other words, the next Ozpocalypse may have begun.The thing is, it may have actually started last year.
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PAPER AIRPLANES - HOW SCIFI BECOMES REALITY |
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By Peter Ostebo — Nerds and Geeks were mortal enemies to Jocks and ‘Cool’ kids when I was growing up, but the nerds eventually got their revenge. No, not like the movie. They got their revenge by staying true to what they loved and growing up with the same desire to see their imaginations turned into realities.
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ACROSS THE UNIVERSE: THE MOST SCIFI BANDS OF ALL-TIME |
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By Bears Fonte — I remember like it was yesterday the first time I heard David Bowie's "Space Oddity" and couldn't believe how clearly I saw the story play out in my mind, like a deleted scene from 2001 released the year before.
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2nd Annual OTHER WORLDS AUSTIN SciFi Film Festival ---------------December 3-5, 2015----------------- |
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